Rockford-area lawmakers reacted with some skepticism to Gov. Pat Quinn’s call to make his 67 percent income tax increase permanent.

Put in place three years ago, the 5 percent income tax is supposed to shrink to 3.75 percent at the end of the year. Quinn made the pitch Wednesday in his budget speech to the General Assembly.

“I don’t know if that’s the best way to go,” said state Rep. Chuck Jefferson, D-Rockford.

“We promised to reduce the tax to the original numbers and the governor’s talking about getting away from that. We’re always going to need the money,” said Jefferson, who likes an alternative proposed by House Speaker Mike Madigan that would slap a 3 percent surcharge on incomes of more than $1 million.

“The speaker’s very good at being creative, and that’s a good thing. I think the millionaire’s tax is the way to go. If I were making $1 million, I don’t think I’d mind paying a 3 percent surcharge,” Jefferson said.

State Rep. Joe Sosnowski, R-Rockford, said he is not surprised Quinn wants to make the temporary increase permanent.

“He’s going to need this and more according to the amount he wants to spend. His message is the same as last year — things are getting better, we just need more money,” Sosnowski said.

Sosnowski faulted Quinn for dismantling a successful effort to thwart fraud and abuse in the Medicaid system. The program, Sosnowski said, “found thousands and thousands of people receiving Medicaid that should not have been getting it. This hurts people who should be getting it. And at the same time, we’re cutting education.”

Sosnowski believes the temporary income tax increase should be reduced as scheduled.

“Put pressure on the leadership to act appropriately. We’re taking in more money than ever before, and they’re not serious about redirecting or reducing spending,” Sosnowski said.

Veteran state Sen. Dave Syverson, R-Rockford, also is not surprised that Quinn wants to extend the income tax increase.

“We were told back when it passed that this money was going to be used to pay bills and then sunset at the end of 2014. We knew back then it wasn’t true and we warned people.”

Syverson, first elected in 1992, said: “It’s clear it was never the governor’s intent to use this to pay bills. That’s evident by looking at how the money was used for pension payments and expansion of Medicaid.”

Despite the law saying the state must pass a balanced budget, “when the tax increase was passed, it was used to cover shortfall spending, not to pay bills.”

Page 2 of 2 - Syverson said the state is taking in $10 billion more in income taxes than it was three years ago, “but these guys still can’t balance the budget. In addition to the 67 percent tax increase, there’s been huge series of fee increases. In the last four years they’ve added over 100 new fees in Illinois, and the existing fees have all gone up.”

And despite all the new tax revenue, “unemployment is still the second worst in the country; we still have more than $7 billion in unpaid bills. So even though we took in $25 billion in new taxes over the last three years, our unpaid bills only were reduced by about $1 billion. That means $24 billion went someplace else,” Syverson said.

State Sen. Steve Stadelman, D-Rockford, said Quinn’s tax extension plan can have political viability if it’s coupled with another Quinn idea to give property taxpayers a refund of $500, to be paid in August.

“This would allow people with lower property taxes a greater benefit,” Stadelman said, noting that property taxes in the Rockford area are “sky high.”

However, if the income tax increase is allowed to expire, Stadelman said, “the state faces major cuts in law enforcement and education.”